Insights, inspiration and ideas. Observations on real-life challenges that our clients are facing and practical strategies to address them.
Recently I was asked to help a senior team of dedicated professionals who provided a key advisory role to the board in a major multinational. They wanted to be even more effective as demands on their time increase, but were facing challenges. It is a familiar story. Their challenges are similar to the challenges many of us are experiencing in our work: too many emails; too many demands; feeling we
The Problem How many sales meetings, executive meetings and board meetings have we all endured where sales results are behind expectations and most of the meeting is taken up by micro-analysing every sale in its final stages to see if it can be closed? A lot. In fact, I can remember only a handful that were relaxed and that was because the year’s quota was in the bag already. How
In my experience, today’s graduates are bright, driven and great fun to have on board. But perhaps not quite as ready as we thought. Apart from the fortunate ones who were able to spend a placement year in industry (which thank goodness is becoming more common), many graduates will previously have had relatively low-paid, short term jobs probably in hospitality or retail. Even the more applied subjects like business studies
The Inner Game of Tennis – Timothy Gallwey At first glance, his book would seem to be suitable for tennis players but it so much more. Best-selling author Timothy Gallwey tackles the problem of how human beings interfere with their own ability to achieve and learn. Based on his own experience of taking part in competitive tennis matches, he suggests that every game has actually two parts – the outer
The Wisdom of Teams – Jon R. Katzenbach If you’re seriously interested in diagnosing nonperforming teams and creating ones that perform, you’ll enjoy this book. This book is the result of research into why teams are important, what separates effective from ineffective teams, and how organizations can tap into the rigour of building highly effective teams which combine to make high-performance organizations. Katzenbach and Smith share their insights into what
What got you here won’t get you there – Marshall Goldsmith I am incredibly fortunate to be able to work with Marshall Goldsmith, world-renowned business educator and coach. Dr. Marshall Goldsmith is the leading expert in leadership behavioural coaching and has a singular ability to help top leaders get results using practical and proven methods. This book is for you if you are an ambitious executive who works hard and is
Interest in the so-called Millennial Generation (those born between 1980 and 2000) has spawned a whole new industry of consultants, writers and academics, all keen to persuade us that these people are different as employees and consumers. They tell us that Millennials require a different approach to employment and management than the previous generations of Generation X and Baby Boomers, but is that really true? There have been a number
Shackleton’s Way – Margot Morrell and Stephanie Capparelli If you are seeking an inspiring book about a leader who showed the true essence of great leadership under pressure, then this book will not disappoint. From 1914 to 1916, Sir Ernest Shackleton and his men survived the wreck of their ship, Endurance, in the crushing Antartic ice, stranded twelve hundred miles from civilisation with no means of communication and no hope
Recently I heard someone say that the behaviour of the modern savvy buyer has caused the traditional sales model to be turned on its head. I’m not sure about that, but it definitely needs to be turned 90 degrees to the right. The traditional product cycle was to develop a product or service, pass it to marketing to promote, marketing would pass leads to sales and sales would follow up with
When I first moved into a sales role, it was drummed into me that I was to sell “solutions”, not products. Solution selling became the mantra for decades, and it even became a trademarked methodology. Unfortunately, the term has become so over-used in sales circles that it is in danger of becoming meaningless. If you ask a sales executive if they sell products or solutions, they will usually say “Solutions,
